Grassley: Huma Stonewalling Investigation of Undisclosed Consulting Gigs While at State Dept.

Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) believes that Huma Abedin, the Hillary Clinton confidante and wife of New York City mayoral candidate Anthony Weiner, and the State Department are stonewalling his investigation of the undisclosed consulting work Abedin did while on the payroll of Clinton’s State Department.

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“The State Department and Ms. Abedin haven’t provided a single document that I requested,” Grassley saidon Thursday. “Putting up a stone wall raises a lot more questions about how the program is being used than it answers. I intend to pursue more complete answers to my questions.”

Abedin, who this week publicly stood by the side of her husband after more raunchy sexting revelations came to light, reportedly had an arrangement where she was designated as a “special government employee” after the birth of her child last year. That enabled Abedin to reportedly work “as a part-time consultant to State, earning $135,000 as a government employee–while also earning $355,000 as a consultant for Teneo, where former President Bill Clinton is a board member.”

Publicly, though, Abedin still identified herself as a deputy chief of staff and did not disclose the arrangement or her extra income even though State Department officials have to make public any “significant sources” of income they are receiving while employed.

Grassley reportedly wants to find out “who authorized Abedin’s change in status, what effect that change had on her security clearances, and whether the department interacted with the companies with which Abedin consulted.”

“I certainly never ‘gathered information from government sources for the purpose of informing investment decisions of Teneo’s clients,’ as the Senate letter suggests,” Abedin wrote wrote to Grassley in a letter earlier this month.

Even liberal watchdog groups such as CREW have called the arrangement Abedin had with the State Department “unusual.”